Once all the formalities had been completed we settled into the yacht club's facilities very nicely thank you. I have never seen a yacht club quite like it , real luxury with everything available including free coffee all day. After day one Rob was on a caffeine high second to none.They don't have walk-on moorings but chain moorings in the bay and run an excellent ferry service 24/7.
We hopped onto a bus and did the tourist thing, visiting the famous beaches at Copacabana and Ipanema . The weather was perfect and the Brazilians love the beach and it doesn't matter what shape you in , they let it all hang out . Rio is a beautiful city surrounded by mountains with magnificent trees lining the streets and what was noticeable was a lack of litter . The public transport bus system works very well so getting around was not an problem .
Urs and l have been given a second invite to the Rio Yacht Club , so we plan on sailing back to Rio sometime within the next few months possibly around the World Cup Soccer period and getting to know the city a lot better .
After gallivanting around the city one day we returned to the boat to find that our neighbour the South African cat Genevieve had been asked to move and our new neighbour was the sailing legend Francis Joyon onboard his flying machine IDEC a 97ft tri with a beam of 54ft displacing 11 tons . Quite a sight this monster trimaran and our Shearwater side by side and she is even lighter than we are . A bit like the beauty and the beast . He currently holds the world record for the fastest single-handed non-stop circumnavigation of 57 days ,6 hours, 23 minutes and 6 seconds averaging 21.6 knots boatspeed . To put that into perspective , our fastest speed that l noted while surfing down a large wave was 11.4 knots . Seemed quite a humble guy and spent most of the time working on his boat . A different breed these speed freaks .
After enjoying Rio we set off early one morning for Baia da Ilha Grande sailing just off the famous beaches of Rio . The forecast at the yacht club was for a 5 to 10 knot NW so the thinking was that we would have a long day of motoring. Twenty miles short of our destination we had 25 knots of wind and 1,5 knots of current on the nose resulting in us arriving at our first planned stop Enseada Das Palmas in the dark and with pouring rain to make things a little uncomfortable .
After dropping anchor and settling the boat and seeing that this was our original destination it was a great excuse to celebrate and the Tequila and everything else in our booze cabinet was soon flying down our throats while classic rock music pumped through the sound system .
The next morning with serious hangovers we stuck our heads out to find ourselves in paradise . This beautiful little bay surrounded by tropical rain forest and far off in the distance we could hear a troop of howler monkeys greeting the day .
We had arrived .
Allan & Ursula Ward: Port Owen, Cape West Coast, South Africa.
Shearwater 39:
- L.O.A. 43ft (13.22m)
- L.O.D. 39ft (12m)
- L.W.L. 34ft (10.3m)
- BEAM 13ft(3.9m)
- DRAFT 6ft(1.8m)
HOW IT ALL BEGAN .
I placed my order on Nebe Boats on the 19/10/1992 for what was initially planned to be a complete factory built yacht that l would sail home to Durban from Capetown once she was completed. Unfortunately due to the demise of Nebe Boats in the early days of her construction it did not turn out that way, so l decided to truck her home to Ramsgate on the KZN South Coast to finish building her in our garden at home.
For many years we could proudly boast that we had the most expensive piece of garden furniture in town, but at the time l had no idea of how massive this project would turn out to be. As anyone who has built a blue water cruiser will tell you, particularly if she is kitted out with all the systems and the equipment that a modern cruiser has onboard these days, it is a daunting task . Looking at the positive aspects of this project, l know the boat intimately in that l designed and installed the systems, so from a repair and maintenance perspective l have no issues carrying out the work that is necessary from time to time.
The big day arrived on the 29/8/2008 when we craned her out of the garden onto a rig to truck her through to Durban for launching . What followed was three months of preparations to ready her for the maiden voyage to our home port in Port Owen on the Cape West Coast.
We had a fast passage down the South African East Coast including a storm off the notorious Wild Coast and arrived in Port Owen in dense fog. Windward had passed her first test with flying colours and since then we have enjoyed some great sailing on the West Coast.
We had a fast passage down the South African East Coast including a storm off the notorious Wild Coast and arrived in Port Owen in dense fog. Windward had passed her first test with flying colours and since then we have enjoyed some great sailing on the West Coast.
The master plan has always been to go cruising, so our plans are to leave for Brazil via Luderitz and St Helena Island at the end of February 2014. So far everything is on track although the “To Do“ list still grows each day.
The purpose of this blog is to record our adventure for ourselves, family and friends. Although it will probably end up being a brief summary of events while we are cruising, we hope you will enjoy and share some of our experiences with us.
LIVING THE DREAM .
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